1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to network based technologies, and more particularly to a method for preventing deep linking to a hypertext document in a hypertext document distribution server.
2. Description of Related Art
The Internet is a set of globally interconnected computers through which multiple users access data and programs from around the world. As an informational sharing mechanism, it comprises a network of networks for interconnecting a plurality of server computers (servers) and a plurality of client computers (clients). The Internet permits a wide variety of communication and informational retrieval mechanisms, including electronic mail (e-mail), File Transfer Protocol (FTP), USENET, and the World Wide Web (Web). Notably, the Web permits users to retrieve and view hypertext document containing not only text, but also pictures, sound, animated images, and video-clips. Moreover, the Web permits user to interact with retrieved hypertext documents.
The Web primarily consists of Web servers and Web browsers. Whereas a Web server hosts hypertext documents, known as Web pages, by storing the Web pages and transmitting those Web pages on command, a Web browser resides on a client computer, and both supplies requests to Web servers for Web pages and displays the retrieved Web pages in a user interface. Each Web page stored in a Web server has associated therewith a Uniform Resource Locator (URL) identifying both a particular domain on the Internet in which the Web server can be located and a location in the Web server where the Web page is stored. The URL permits any given Web page to be distinguished from all other Web pages.
In operation, a Web browser can accept as input a URL of a requested Web page which can be provided by a user through any suitable means, but typically by keyboard or hyperlink. The Web browser can receive the URL and transmit a request for the Web page to a Web server residing at a domain specified in the URL. Upon receiving the request, the Web server can identify in the URL the location of the requested Web page. If the requested Web page resides at the location specified in the URL, the Web server can serve the requested Web page to the requesting client. Subsequently, the Web browser residing in the client can display the requested Web page.
A Web page as described in the foregoing specification can include a document encoded in hypertext markup language (HTML). Notably, HTML permits the embedding of URLs in a Web page. When a URL is embedded in a Web page, upon display of the Web page, a user can select the URL, using for example a mouse pointing device. Upon selecting the URL, a request can be transmitted by the Web browser for the Web page denoted by the embedded URL. In this way, the displayed. Web page is said to have been hyperlinked to the Web page denoted by the embedded URL. In consequence, a user can cause the Web browser to retrieve a Web page not only by explicitly supplying a URL to the Web browser, but also by selecting an embedded URL in a displayed Web page.
URLs embedded in a Web page are traditionally referred to as hyperlinks. Hyperlinks are not merely limited to referencing Web pages. Rather, hyperlinks can reference several types of objects distributed on the Internet. For example, hyperlinks can refer to graphics files, sound files, audio and video recordings, and non-HTML documents, for example portable document format (PDF) documents. Hyperlinks are often displayed in the form of text highlighted in bold-face, different colors or by underlining. Still, the display of hyperlinks are typically not limited in this regard. Rather, hyperlinks can be displayed in the form of a button or graphic that can be “activated” by the click of a mouse pointer.
A hyperlink can refer to almost any other Web page in a Web server on any other domain, including different Web pages stored in the same Web server or in an entirely different Web server. Significantly, Web pages linked by hyperlinks, in of themselves, can include hyperlinks to yet more Web pages thereby interconnecting almost every document posted on the Internet with almost every other document. Thus, by activating different hypertext links to a given Web page, different readers can arrive at the same page by a plurality of routes, each having viewed different Web pages along the way. For example, a user can access any given Web page on the Web by directly typing the corresponding URL into a browser. Alternatively, the same user can access the same Web page by following a series of hyperlinks from other Web pages leading thereto.
Web pages often are grouped in a Web site wherein the Web site can reflect an overall theme. For example, a Web site can include a car rental Web site in which viewers of Web pages in the Web site can survey available rental cars and consummate a rental car transaction. In another example, a Web site can include a corporate marketing Web site in which viewers of Web pages in the Web site can survey various corporate products, location and contact information and press releases relating to the company. As such, typically, Web sites have a preferred entry point referred to as a home page from which a user can access other Web pages in the Web site.
“Deep links” are hyperlinks which can defeat a Web site's intended method of navigation. For example, many Web sites rely upon the home page as an intended initial entry point to the Web pages which comprise the site. The home page can display contextually appropriate information, for example a summary of the Web site, a table of contents, advertisements or written disclaimers. Deep links are hyperlinks specifying a Web page contained in a Web site which normally can be accessed only by first accessing the home page of the Web site. A user performing “deep linking” can bypass the home page and effectively the display of the contextually appropriate information merely by specifying the URL of the interior Web page.
Deep linking has been used in order to perpetrate an illusion that a source or author of an document interior to a Web site is other than its true source. In other words, the hyperlinked content can be made to appear as if coming from other than its true author. Specifically, unauthorized deep links have been embedded in Web pages not associated with the Web site of the deep linked Web page in order to provide a direct point of access to information contained in the Web page referenced by the deep link. With only the URL denoted by the deep link marking the true identity of the deep linked Web page, only the most diligent of users can observe the source of the deep linked Web page. Though several solutions to deep linking have been proposed, for example password protection of Web pages in a Web site, or back-end communication synchronization between Web pages in a Web site, the complexity involved in implementing and maintaining such solutions seldom warrants the use of the same. Thus, a need remains for an effective and efficient method for preventing deep linking in a Web site.